Boostrapping : CT.05 - Jury Trials in Lower Courts
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Proposed administrative procedure - CT.05
Jury   Trial   in   Lower Courts

Purpose : To reduce nexusproness in lower courts

Pre-requisite reading : Why Jury System is superior than judge system


    Contents
  1. Background
  2. Problem with existing lower courts
  3. Proposed improvement : CT.05
  4. Advantages of CT.05
  5. Draft of the act to create procedure CT.05


Background

The purpose is to bring India's administration/courts at par with West. How? By improving record keeping in GoI-offices and reducing nexuses in GoI-offices and courts. How? We would need several laws to achieve that.

CT.05 is one of these proposed laws. (to see the list of some of the laws, please click here). The proposed law CT.05 creates a LESS nexusprone mechanism to decide guilty/not-guility and punishments in lower courts.



Problem with existing lower courts

A lower courts' judges' career is some 20-30 years long (he may get promoted to High Court during this career). During this career, he is posted in several courts in the State. Each posting is 2-3 years long after which he is transferred to another court in the same State.

Before a person becomes judges, it is normally the case that he would have worked as a lawyer for some 1-5 years in some court, generally in the SAME state.

It is basic nature of human to form nexuses with surrounding humans. Given such a long career as a lawyer before a person becomes judge, and given such a long career while he serves as a judge, it is obvious that many judges end up forming nexuses with lawyers, officers, policemen, criminals and wealthy individuals who cater these judges. And judges also end up forming nexuses with senior judges, Ministers and officers who can assist them in getting favorable transfers and promotions. These nexuses invariably impair their judgements and favor only the career criminals.



Proposed improvement - CT.05 : Jury System in Lower Courts

  1. The District Public Prosecutor will select and summon 30 citizens at random from the District, and form a Grand Jury. Each Grand Juror will have a term of three months. So every month, 1/3rd will retire.

  2. Any case that comes before the lower court, the Grand Jurors will decide if the case requires a detailed hearing.

  3. If over 15 Grand Jurors decide that the case requires a detailed hearing, the in-charge will summon 12 citizens from the district at random to form a Jury.

  4. The Jurors would decide the acquital/punishment after hearing both the sides. The person would be punished ONLY if over 8 Jurors approve a punishment, or else he will be acquitted.



Advantages of CT.05

  1. The Jury System is less prone to judge-lawyer nexuses. Say a lawyer handles 8 cases a month or say 100 cases a year or 400 cases in 4-5 years. In the present system, where one judge presides for 3-5 years, the lawyer to bribe or form nexus with only one judge to get unfair advantage in these 400 cases. But in Jury System, the lawyer will need to form nexuses with 4000 Jurors to get unfair advantage in a large number of cases. This is next to impossible.

  2. The Jury System is less prone to judge-criminal nexuses. Say a career criminal is committing 20-50 crimes a month of beating, harassing etc etc. Say 10 victims decide to file the cases. In the present system, all 10 cases are likely to go before the same 2-3 judges. So the criminal has easy time : he has to establish nexus with ONLY 2-3 judges and all the 10 cases a month or 120 cases of the year will get easily taken care of. But in Jury System, the criminal will have to influence 100-120 citizens a month or rather 1000-1200 citizens a year, which is next to impossible.

  3. The Jury System is faster, as each Jury is given ONLY one case, unlike quasi-judge, who is loaded with 100s of cases. So the verdict would come within days.
So by all means, using Jury in lower courts gives a far less nexusprone and yet faster method than existing one.



Draft of the act to create procedure CT.05

To enact CT.05, the citizens would need to pass an act in the Parliament. I have written that draft. To look at the draft, please click here.

It will be wiser for citizens to first enact procedure LM.03, and then use LM.03 to pass this act. To know about procedure LM.03, please click here.



If you have any other question, please mail it to MehtaRahulC@yahoo.com. Thousand thanks in advance.





Next - CT.06 : Jury System in High Courts